Celtics-Knicks Grades

Brandon Bass, PF28 MIN | 5-6 FG | 1-1 FT | 7 REB | 1 AST | 0 STL | 3 BLK | 3 TO | 11 PTS | -8
Bass quietly had a very nice game. It’s a shame to waste a night where Bass attacked the glass and scored efficiently. A stat line like this is supposed to be evidence of stellar play by the entire team, not in spite of it.I also liked the way he defended the perimeter. It’s not easy to defend shot-makers like Carmelo Anthony and JR Smith and Bass did a great job of getting close without fouling. The aforementioned shot-makers unfortunately made shots.

Jeff Green, PF39 MIN | 6-14 FG | 6-6 FT | 10 REB | 6 AST | 1 STL | 1 BLK | 2 TO | 19 PTS | -3
Green a really fantastic game. He still had his moments of getting stuck on picks and not finishing hard but you easily live with those flaws if the production is 19 points and 10 rebounds. Hell, I’d settle for 10 points and 10 rebounds. That’s his first double-double of the season.

Paul Pierce, SF36 MIN | 5-10 FG | 5-7 FT | 6 REB | 6 AST | 1 STL | 1 BLK | 6 TO | 16 PTS | -14
On the surface, it appears as though Pierce had a nice little game. 16 points on 5-of-10 shooting is definitely something the Celtics can live with. As you look down the stat sheet, however, it isn’t long before you see the mark of the beast: 6 rebounds, 6 assists, and-the clincher- 6 turnovers. Each turnover seemed to occur at the worst possible time and of the worst possible type: jump passes.

Avery Bradley, PG34 MIN | 3-11 FG | 0-0 FT | 3 REB | 0 AST | 0 STL | 0 BLK | 1 TO | 6 PTS | -14
Bradley had an extremely forgettable night. He got called for fouls early which really hampered his aggressiveness on the defensive end. He then capped off an awful shooting night by being REALLY short on a three attempt. By that time, many of the Celtics’ fans had filed out and you could clearly hear the Knicks’ fans not allowing Bradley to forget how short his shot was.

Jordan Crawford, SG41 MIN | 5-11 FG | 2-2 FT | 4 REB | 6 AST | 1 STL | 0 BLK | 6 TO | 14 PTS | -11
Crawford is such an enigma. In the first half, he drew two defenders and made a Rondo-like wrap-around pass to a cutting big for an easy bucket. In the second half, he drew two defenders and tried to shoot over them instead of hitting a wide open Terrence Williams right behind him. Who is this guy?

Shavlik Randolph, PF5 MIN | 1-1 FG | 0-2 FT | 4 REB | 0 AST | 1 STL | 0 BLK | 0 TO | 2 PTS | 0
The best part of Randolph’s game is his hustle. There’s almost nothing pretty about what he does but he works hard whenever he’s in the game. It’s hard to tell whether or not his hustle is amplified by the situations he’s in when he’s actually on the court. In other words, it could be easy to look like you’re trying in garbage time when no one else is. Regardless, losing when not playing Randolph (and White) and losing when playing Randolph (and White) is still losing.

Terrence Williams, SG23 MIN | 2-7 FG | 3-4 FT | 5 REB | 1 AST | 1 STL | 0 BLK | 0 TO | 7 PTS | -8
Gimmie more, gimmie more. The Celtics don’t have a guy on their roster that can blow by their opponent and get to the rim as well as Williams can. Green tries to finish over people and Pierce isn’t blowing by anyone. More Williams = Less Long Twos + More Shots At The Rim.

Jason Terry minus 18 and he gets a B- . The guy has been awfull to say the least. I hate watching him as he just reminds me why I miss Ray Allen so much.

Anthony

How can CH deny now that they don't grade Bass on a curve? Besides the fact that nobody deserved a B+ on a crappy game like tonite, how does he get the same grade a JGreen even just looking at the box score? KMart had most of his points and rebs in the 1st quarter against Bass. And 3 TO for a guy that really doesn't have the ball in his hand often is atypical.

No grade for Doc?

KG deserves A+. Melo's whole game tonite was throw it up, grab offensive rebound for putback or and 1.

High Rollers

The worst part about this game: the C’s played without identity. Add Courtney Lee and you almost beat Miami, what???

Match-ups are one thing, but tonight showed something else.

CelticsBIG3

I was at this game. Anyone who think Jeff Green deserves a B+ is only looking at his boxscore. Another effortless, gutless performance from him and the whole team in general. This was the first game I've been to in 42 tries during the Pierce-Garnett era where the opposing team's fans were louder than the Celtics fans at many times during the game. In fact, I have a tradition of standing until the team scores their first bucket and I was asked to sit down by one of the TD Garden ushers. Thats how flat and crappy the building was 2nite. Worst I've been apart of. This team is SCARY bad without KG in the lineup. I repeat. SCARY BAD.

KillerGymRat

Couldn't agree more. Bass and Green put up good numbers. But by basically hiding for most of the game and scoring points and grabbing rebounds when they didn't matter.

Both stood around an awful lot watching Martin, Melo and Smith grab their own misses and put them back. It was an embarrassing gutless effort. Sorry you had to be there in person. Nothing worse then being in the stands on a night when a team is phoning it in.

fabzzz

What points don't matter? Unless its in the last minutes of the game, which in this case it wasn't.

NZNICK33

Seriously? Green was one of the only C's hustling out there? Irrational hatred is not very becoming.

CelticsBIG3

The fact that you placed a question mark after Green was the only one hustling out there is my case and point. He wasn't. No one was. Only Pierce who tried to get something going before Doc thankfully pulled the plug on him.

Anthony

I'm re-watching the game and I have to disagree and say you have your JGreen haterade glasses on. JGreen was very good on both ends for majority of the game. He played Melo as well as you can hope but you can't expect him to defend that first possession great and recover enough to defend the 2nd, 3rd possession and still grab the rebound. There's a reason why Melo is a top 5, top 10 player. The fact that JGreen had 19-10-6 and 6-6 FT on what you say is a bad game shows that you're expectations of him may be very off. Actually Bass and Pierce were the ones that missed a lot of the easy rebounds. Pierce forced the issue and any way you look at it, you can't defend the 6 TOs.

Ge0gre

I would have loved to have you guys grade my papers in college. I'd have a 4.0 In other words, you are way too kind. I think the C's can beat any team on a given night and am looking forward to the playoffs. I just hope they can get their mojo going by then.

ElRoz

This Celtics team is not THAT bad…wait until the playoffs start and KG and Pierce are zeroed in..and Doc shortens the rotation. They will play better for sure. I'm not saying they will get to the ECF – who know, they might – but at least they will play better for sure.

Randolph continues to rebound very well – 4 rebs in 5 minutes. Look at his other appearances and total – the man can rebound very well. On the other hand – he is like 0-8 at the FT line. He has not made a FT this season out of 6 or 10 attempts: WTF?

KillerGymRat

I truly hope you're right about this team stepping it up in the playoffs, but I have to be honest, I'm not quite convinced. If you look at the roster now there are so many players who have not been playoff tested.

Randolph's numbers are misleading. I'm not saying he isn't a good rebounder, I honestly can't tell yet until he's on the court when the game matters and we see if those numbers hold up. Tonight all those boards fell into his hands in garbage time with NYC basically chucking and jogging back. He did grab one solid rebound on the offensive end which has me hoping he will get some real run, but other then that the rest were just because he happened to be the only guy under the basket.

KillerGymRat

Giving Bass a B+ is ridiculous. Bass seriously looked like his feet where stapled to the floor anyone who went into the paint blew right by him and got the rebounds on their missed shots. Great, the guy was efficient shooting. Mostly because he kept turning the ball over before he could shoot. Then only took wide open looks when they didn't really matter or had a putback or two…aslo when it didn't really matter.

Green was moderately better, especially during the stretch at the start of the third, but again couldn't hit the 3 and couldn't finish or convince the D he was going to do anything but drive hard to his right.

Nobody on this night deserved more than a C minus. And truthfully they should all get F's. This was an embarrassment. We might wind up playing NYC in the first round. They are going to be very, very, happy about that after this effort.

Morpheus

I am convinced. This team will/simply can not step it up in the playoffs.

Are you all forgetting our best playoff performer Rondo, is out or what? Who’s going to handle the playoff pressure at point? AB? Come on…Pierce? – probably our best option if you can live with the high turnover rate. Lee? None of these players resemble any skill as a pg, a position that is absolutely crucial in the playoffs.

Then there’s the new guys who haven’t been playoff tested as far as I know of.

This team will not get past the 1st round if they face Miami and i’m not so sure anymore they can beat Indy or NY depending on where they finish, likely 8th seed.

High Rollers

Maybe it's kind of like being down 12+ with only 4 minutes to go in the fourth. We're playing really sloppy, chicken-without-its-head type basketball right now, but there are still eleven or twelve games to go over the course of the next three weeks. Nobody's walking through that door except Lee and (knock on wood) KG, but (and this is hopefully the last time I mention it) these guys can at least rediscover the mojo that had them almost beating the streakers. They can do a lot in 4 minutes.

check12check

So what is everybody's team in the west? mine is the grizz.

hydrofluoric

Two teams have multiple wins in the TD Garden this season: the Bucks and the Knicks.

Suffice it to say this is not what I was expecting when the season began…

… but am I surprised? Not really.

NZNICK33

Support the team when they win, shit on them when they lose. That's how it's done?

Josh_5

I'm with Nick. With all the guys we had out due to injury last night, the Knicks were the better team. No KG or Lee (on top of no Rondo or Sully) means theres gonna be nights like this that suck to watch. That being said, however, I do like this team's fight once we get healthy. One last thing, is anybody else wondering what the hell happened to Avery Bradley? The guys is baaad and I did not expect this at all.

High Rollers

I'm not worried about AB. He seems like a pretty determined guy. Obviously frustrated by this recent stretch. But there's definitely no quit in him. He didn't get the Pit Bull moniker for nothin'.

Anthony

I can't speak for everyone else but I can't agree with NZNICK's statement. For me, a lot of the losses seem be from lack of effort. By comparison, last year's team, though not as talented, tried a lot harder. They started the same way last season. with injuries, tough losses, etc. but you can see the team wasn't discouraged and made whatever adjustments they needed by season's end. But all year, it was never about lack of effort.

Look at the criticism of JET, CLee, JGreen, Wilcox, Rondo, etc. Was any of those criticism evident last year?